NOTES OF RECENT CASES insurer's branch office in the state, learning of the situation, directed the agent to return the policy and subsequently informed the home office of insured's death and the home office gave directions to have the local agent mark the notes " canceled" and return them to the administrator. The local agent then wrote the applicant's widow, who was the beneficiary, stating that deceased had applied for insurance and gave a note, but that the com pany having declined the application, the notes were returned. Under these facts the court held that the company was liable on the policy under the principle of estoppel, and in reaching this conclusion it is said, " the agent's hand was the company's hand, his office was its office, and his promises and assurances the promises and assur ances of his principal notwithstanding any undis closed instructions or limitations existing in his contract of employment." Reference is made to Ins. Co. v. Stone (Kan.), 58 Pac. 986, and Inter national Trust Co. v. Ins. Co., 71 Fed. 81, 17 C. C. A. 608. MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS. (Nuisance.) Iowa. — In Wheeler v. City of Ft. Dodge, 108 N. W, 1057, a city is held liable for personal injuries to a pedestrian which arose under an unusual state of facts. Preparatory to a celebration of the Fourth of July, the city council by resolution granted an organization known as the " Commercial Club" the privilege of the streets, and pursuant to such authority the Commercial Club induced a manager of entertainments to visit the city with one of his exhibitions, and his coming and the proposed " slide for life " by a young woman under his management, were advertised as one of the attractions of the celebration. A wire on which the performance was to be executed was erected early in the day or during the evening of the previous day, stretching from the roof of the court house, which stood flush with the sidewalk, downward, and outward and across the street where it was fastened near the ground to a tele phone pole. The apparatus was erected and was seen by various members of the council and other city officers, and, as a crowd gathered to witness the performance, police officers guarded the street under the rope, in an attempt to keep the carriage way clear, but no attempt was made to rope off any part of the sidewalk beneath the slide, nor was the public excluded therefrom. In order to make the slide, the performer was attached to the wire by a harness which was placed about her body and from which a strap was attached to a pulley running loose along the wire. At the appointed time a large crowd had
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assembled, and by reason of some defect in the harness the performer fell, fatally injuring her self, and striking and injuring a pedestrian. It was shown that plaintiff did not know of the proposed slide, and was injured while standing on the sidewalk beneath the wire. It was held that the wire under the circumstances constituted a nuisance, and that the city having permitted the street to be obstructed, was chargeable with notice of the nuisance, and, in legal effect, the creator thereof. In support of the principle, the court cites, Bohen v. Waseca, 32 Minn. 176, 19 N. W. 730, 50 Am. Rep. 564, where a city was held liable for injury to a traveler on the sidewalk by the fall of an awning which projected into the street space from an abutting building, and also Hume v. Mayor, 74 N. Y. 264, and, Drake v. Lowell, 13 Mete. (Mass.), 292 A somewhat similar case referred to in the opinion is Richmond v. Smith (Va.) 43 S E. 346, where the city acting by its council, assumed to permit certain streets to be occupied by structures of various kinds for the use of a street fair, and as a part of the entertainment a " cake walk " was performed upon a platform surrounded by a rail ing. The crowd gathered to view the " classic performance," filled the sidewalk and pressed against the railing, which broke, injuring plaintiff, and in holding the city liable the court says. " It was the duty of the city to abate the nuisance, and the sin of permission in granting the permit cannot be less than the sin of omission in failing to discharge its duty" A contention that the conclusion reached by the court was inconsistent with a former decision, Ball v. Woodbine, 61 Iowa, 83, 15 N. W. 846, 47 Am. Rep. 805, where a city was held not liable for the act of its officers in discharging fire works or. failing to prevent such discharge, whereby plaintiff was injured, is held untenable, the essence of the complaint in such case having been either the personal misconduct of certain persons who happened to be officers, or the failure of such officers to properly police the city, while in the case at bar the cause of action was a nuisance created and existing in the streets by the act of the city in violation of its duty to keep the streets free from nuisances. As bearing on the general question as to the liability of the city under the circumstances, reference is made to Grove v. Ft Wayne, 45 Ind. 429, 15 Am. Rep. 262; Hughes v Fon Du Lac (Wis.) 41 N. W. 408; Wells v. Brooklyn (Sup.) 41 N. Y. Supp. 143; Wood on Nuisance, § 472; Champlin v. Village of Penn Yan, 34 Hun (N. Y.) 33; Wilbert v. Sheboygan (Wis.) 99 N. W. 331:2
